


Unwritten: First Lines

by LadyLuckDoubt



Category: Bully: Scholarship Edition
Genre: 50 Sentences, Character Study, Essay, read-between-the-lines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-03
Updated: 2013-01-03
Packaged: 2017-11-23 12:27:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/622135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyLuckDoubt/pseuds/LadyLuckDoubt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tad tries to write a personal essay for English class, but can’t. These are his attempts at an opening. Imagine every one of these lines written, then struck out and then followed by the next—written, read over, struck out... and so on and so forth.</p>
<p>Default set, Alpha, from the 1sentence community on LJ. Yes, I've deviated from their prescription, though I liked the idea of using 50 random words as springboards to create something.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>This came up quite randomly. You know how teachers in high school English classes seem to love making people write personal essays? Well, I wondered how Tad would cope with that sort of deal. Trigger warnings here for family violence; while it's hardly a secret in canon mentions in the game, it's not something that generally appears in fanfic, so I figured I'd warn for it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unwritten: First Lines

 

  
  
Comfort is arriving at the old school gates with the knowledge that for a few months there will be peace and I’m allowed to forget the home that I come from.  
  
  
  
My mother used to kiss me goodnight and tell me, "It won’t always be like this, I promise." And when I’d close my eyes and pretend to have fallen asleep, I swear sometimes, I’d hear her voice soften to a whisper tinted with the sound of tears and the confession, "I’m so sorry, darling."  
  
  
  
People talk about pain like it’s the most abstract casual thing, though I know that pain can be as simple and as brutal as being punched in the stomach for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.  
  
  
  
Potatoes have eyes, but they can’t see anything.  
  
  
  
Rain makes sense to me; it’s like the atmosphere gets overloaded with a lot of stuff that it can’t deal with and finally it just explodes in a gush of release because there’s nothing else it  _can_  do.  
  
  
  
My father and I could never see the point of Godiva chocolates, and we secretly preferred Hershey’s despite my mother saying how  _common_  they were. I used to keep a stash of Hershey bars in the drawer beside my bed and it made me feel inexplicably great, even though I could never really pinpoint  _why._  
  
  
  
My father had a mobile telephone back in the old days when they were referred to as bricks and the latest model is so much smaller and lighter and it doesn’t leave bruises when thrown at you.  
  
  
  
People have ears but they don’t need to hear things to know what is happening around them.  
  
  
  
I am a Spencer and my mother is now a Spencer and this means that she’s no longer a Althorp-Smith and we became worthless.  
  
  
  
The steam and the tinkle-and-slush of water, the scent of jasmine and calla lily with Scandinavian herbs; the flicker of candles against marbled walls, the languid warmth and the uncompromising heat of the water—and the privacy-- makes for the most divine experiences I have enjoyed.  
  
  
  
When dear grandmama passed on, their side of the family said that Daddy was to blame for her death for marrying my mother and ruining her life and reputation.  
  
  
  
Derby tells me after the act that it’s not really sex because he  _enjoys_  having sex. And I would normally not stand for such treatment-- but it’s the only familiar touch I’m accustomed to which isn’t entirely vicious. I guess you could say I’m weak like that.  
  
Of course I’m weak—I wouldn’t cry about it afterwards if I wasn’t.   
  
  
  
My father’s car can go from zero to ninety miles within ten seconds; his mood can go from benign to terrifying in less time than that.  
  
  
  
Sometimes I like to stand on the edge of the balcony near the greenhouse and let the wind rush against me, as though willing fate to take its course.  
  
Sometimes I think there would be a sense of freedom in letting fate make decisions like that for me.  
  
But I think, somewhere deep down, that life really is meant to be lived.  
  
  
  
Being a prep means that you have to deal, on a daily basis, with everyone else’s envy at the fact that they’re  _not_  us.  
  
  
  
I know I shouldn’t, but I bite my nails. It’s not as though I enjoy doing it, and fingernails don’t have flavour.  
  
  
  
Sometimes I see couples—not married couples or people’s parents, who always appear a bit stiff and controlled; but couples like Derby and Bif—and they seem so wrapped up in one another, like every move and moment depends on the other person, and I truly fail to understand how and why.  
  
When two people are wed, the phrase "Til death do us part" is mentioned—no one ever talks about "forever," which would seem far too optimistic, though the "death do us part" words make me wonder if Daddy could kill Mummy if he wished.  
  
I worry that I’m going to do the same when I marry, as though it’s every bit genetic as much as good looks and a sense of superiority is, that this is something else I’ve inherited.  
  
It makes me feel ill when I think about it for more than a fleeting moment.  
  
  
  
I cannot fathom someone naming their child "Melody"—it sounds so ridiculously made-up and white trash.  
  
There are billions of stars out there and most people don’t know the names of any of them.   
  
  
  
They say that "home is where the heart is" and I feel utterly torn most of the time.   
I don’t know where home is, and I don’t know where my heart is.  
  
  
  
Fear is coming home for the holidays after one’s report card has arrived and not knowing what was on it.   
  
  
Light and noise—so many people seem to find the drama of a storm exciting and almost exhilarating, though I can’t say I do—I prefer the quiet dry calm when I know there won’t be a need for rain afterwards.  
  
  
  
People talk about bonds as though they’re all sweetness and light and closeness and support and as though they’re eternal—though they forget to mention that when you have them, you’re also  _bound_  by them.  
  
  
  
I don’t understand the stockmarket properly, though I understand the concept of trade, that everything is for sale and that for everything in life, there is a price—I learned about that when I was very young.  
  
Daddy was smart and he invested in a software company just as computers were becoming widespread and used by everyone, even  _poor people_ —and everything changed.  
  
My father is ruthless and brutal and uncomfortable when out of his league, though no one can fault his abilities in the corporate world: the man has a gift when it comes to business.   
  
  
  
Gord tells me should smile more because I look haggard when I don’t.  
I look haggard because I don’t have that youthful exuberance and innocence that he does.  
  
  
  
I cannot complete anything, even a first paragraph of an English assignment, because I am weak and pathetic and I start saying things that I should really be telling my therapist and not Mr. Galloway.  
  
  
  
I don’t understand how people can stare at clouds as though they are actually seeing something—it seems entirely pointless, really. Though every now and then I look up at the sky and wonder what lies beyond the world I’m accustomed to.  
  
  
  
They say "the meek shall inherit," and I  _know_  I’m going to. After I’ve survived hell.  
  
  
  
I remember that greaseball, Peanut, telling us that the world didn’t revolve around us, that it revolved around the sun—though he forgot that we’re  _son_ s, too. I suppose this would make Pinky the moon, and even though it’s not the same thing, the moon has respect and standing in its own right.  
  
  
  
As much as I’d rather not stay at home, I think it breaks my heart a little when I see how my mother waves goodbye at the school gates at the beginning of the year. And then she turns swiftly, and I hear the  _clip-clip_  of her heels on bitumen, and I see the back of her head and her immaculately styled hair and I hope it will stay like that while I’m away, though I know it won’t.   
  
  
  
When you think about it, supernovas get noticed, yet it’s only because they’re exploding and turning themselves into nothing.


End file.
